


All-American Dream

by Lauralot



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Blood, Body Dysphoria, Depression, Gen, Slurs, Smoking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-22
Updated: 2016-10-22
Packaged: 2018-08-24 01:26:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8350867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lauralot/pseuds/Lauralot
Summary: Steve finally got everything he wanted, but he's wearing tights.





	

“Nazi bastard!”

The match stills in Steve’s hand before he can light the cigarette. He doesn’t actually need to smoke; his new metabolism obliterates the nicotine before he can even feel it, let alone crave it. But it gives him the excuse to slip out for a minute before each USO gig, have a moment alone with his thoughts.

“You can smoke backstage, can’t you?” one of the chorus girls had asked the first time, striking a match of her own. “No need to go outside.”

“Habit,” Steve had said. In the worst days, toward the end, even the smoke from the asthma cigarettes had given his mother horrible, bloody coughing fits.

He misses the taste of the asthma cigarettes, but he’s not about to buy a pack when there are people out there who really need them.

His cigarette is forgotten now, anyway, dangling in his mouth as he listens to the sounds around the corner. Shouting, a scuffle. Kids.

“Traitor!”

“Dirty Jap-loving—”

Maybe it’s a game. But as soon as the thought enters Steve’s mind, there’s a very real cry of pain. The match burns down to his fingertips and he drops it, biting back a curse as he rounds the corner into the alleyway. “Hey.”

There’s a gaggle of boys pressed against the theater wall, pinning their target down. The kid has red hair and a split lip. From what Steve can see of his body, he looks about the size of the other boys, but he’s got no chance when it’s five against one.

All of the aggressors are staring at him now, awestruck. Steve doubts he’ll ever get used to seeing that look. “Captain America,” the apparent ringleader gasps, his fist still wrapped up in the redhead’s shirt collar.

“Let him go,” Steve commands, feeling as out of place in this new body as he ever has. It was always Bucky who finished fights. What the hell will Bucky think of Steve once he comes home? If he comes home. He’ll be stunned. Speechless. Maybe angry. Angry that Steve got the body to fight but stayed here, prancing around stages like a show pony while Bucky was in the trenches risking his life—

“He started it!” One of the boys protests, breaking Steve out of his thoughts.

“He deserves it,” the leader insists. “He’s a traitor, Captain America, he doesn’t want us to stop the Krauts, we’re on your side—”

“I don’t like bullies,” Steve says flatly. He takes another step forward, looming like he never could before. “They’re never on my side. Get out of here.”

They scatter like startled pigeons. The redhead straightens up, wiping at his bloodied mouth.

“You all right?” Steve asks. Belatedly, he realizes the cigarette’s fallen to the pavement by his feet; he must have dropped it when he told the kids off.

“Fine,” the redhead says brusquely, now trying to straighten his mussed hair. His face is red, though Steve can’t tell if that’s from humiliation or the start of bruises. “I can handle myself.”

Steve almost smiles, reminded of himself whenever Bucky caught him fighting. But remembering Bucky wipes the smile away as quickly as it began. “Can you get home all right?”

“I’m not going home,” the redhead snaps. He wipes at his mouth again. “My sister’s in there,” he adds, muttered, jerking his thumb toward the theater building. “ _She_ wants to see you.”

Steve doesn’t miss the implication that _he_ doesn’t. “Is that why they were beating up on you? Because you didn’t want to go in?”

“It’s none of your business!” His face flushes even redder, this time with anger. “Just go back inside and do your dumb show and leave me alone!”

There’s a beat of silence between them. The redhead turns away, wiping at his face a third time.

“Don’t touch your lip if you want the bleeding to stop,” Steve says. “That’ll make it open back up.”

The redhead sniffs angrily but is otherwise silent.

Steve lets the quiet stretch out. He ought to go back inside and let the kid be; it’s clear he’s not wanted. But just as he resolves to go, the redhead speaks, fast and defensive. “Not wanting to see some dumb show doesn’t mean I don’t want us to win the war.”

A nod. Steve doesn’t want to upset the boy any further by saying the wrong thing.

“It’s stupid!” the redhead shouts as if Steve _had_ argued. “Bonds and scrap metal and—and—it’s horseshit! It doesn’t make anybody safe and it doesn’t bring them home any faster!”

He cuts off abruptly, chest heaving. His eyes are wet and Steve knows it’s not from pain.

“When did your father ship out?” he asks gently.

“Four months next Tuesday.” The answer is immediate, proud and angry all at once. “He’s in the 101st. He’s actually _fighting_ , he’s not like you. And almost every night I can hear Ma crying when she thinks we’re asleep.”

It’s as if every self-loathing thought Steve’s had since the war began has been thrown back in his face, and Steve has to keep himself from flinching. He settles down on an empty crate, hearing the wood strain under the weight of him. His body’s too big, all awkward angles and bulk. He can’t even sit right anymore. He can’t do anything.

“My mother used to cry over my father,” he tries. And over money and food and everything else.

Silence. The redhead worries at a hole in the knee of his pants, and Steve wonders if it was there before the other boys ganged up on him.

“I wish I could be like your father,” Steve says. Like his father. Like Bucky. Hell, at this point he’d give anything to be back in the body he used to have. The torment of having the strength and stamina he’s always wanted and still being unable to do a goddamn thing, it eats at him. Deeper and wider every day. “It’s all I’ve ever wanted, to fight. I never planned to do all of this.”

For the first time, the redhead really meets his eyes.

“My best friend’s in the 107th,” Steve says. “Same as my father. And it kills me, that this is the closest I can get to serving.”

“Then why don’t you quit?”

“Because these shows sell bonds,” Steve explains. “And if that’s the only way I can help, and if I can make people smile and forget about things while I’m on stage? I guess I’ll have to learn to live with that.” No matter how empty it feels inside.

“You’re not what I expected Captain America to be like,” the redhead says.

Steve smiles. “I’m just Steve under this costume. Steve Rogers.” He offers his gloved hand.

The redhead takes it, sticking out his bruised chin. “Alex Pierce.”

“Steve!” One of the alto girls, Dorothy, sticks her head around the corner. “We’re on in five!”

“Good to meet you, Alex.” Steve stands up, freeing his hands to brush the crate splinters from his costume. “You should at least wait in the lobby, okay? In case those kids come back.”

“I can take care of myself!” Alex insists. He lowers his gaze, shuffling his shoes. “But...I _guess_ I can sit through one dumb show. Just so my sister’s not alone.”

Steve tries not to smile. “Sounds good.”

“I hope you sell a lotta bonds,” Alex says.

“I hope so, too.”

“Break a leg, Steve,” Alex adds, walking backwards toward the front of the building.

 _If only._ Steve holds in a sigh and makes his way back to the stage.


End file.
